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Italy gets populist government

ROME — Giuseppe Conte was sworn in as prime minister of Italy on Friday, at the head of a populist government of the 5Star Movement and the League.

Once installed in Rome, the new government is likely to take a Euroskeptic stance and clash with Brussels on the EU budget, immigration and European sanctions against Russia, where it favors a more conciliatory stance.

Conte, who was a little-known law professor until being propelled onto the national political stage this week, unveiled a Cabinet team that includes 5Star and League leaders Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini as vice premiers.

The Cabinet secured the approval of President Sergio Mattarella late on Thursday. He had refused to approve Conte's first Cabinet line-up because it included a Euroskeptic economist, 81-year-old Paolo Savona, as the proposed economy minister.

On their second attempt at proposing a Cabinet, the populist alliance insisted on giving Savona a ministerial post anyway — ironically, as EU affairs minister, where he will ensure there is plenty of confrontation with Brussels.

As well as being deputy prime ministers, 5Star leader Di Maio will lead the newly created labor and industry ministry, while League leader Salvini will be interior minister. From that position, he will be able to implement some of the far-right League's hard-line policies, such as speeding up the deportation of illegal immigrants.

Economy professor Giovanni Tria gets the economy ministry job instead of Savona, and Enzo Moavero Milanesi, a former EU affairs minister in the technocratic government of Mario Monti, will be foreign minister.

Tria is not a household name in Italy. In recent opinion pieces, he denounced Germany’s surplus as an indicator of the failure of the euro. However, he is not regarded as a supporter of Italy leaving the eurozone.

“We will work hard to reach the objectives included in the government contract and to improve the quality of life of all Italians,” Conte said in a brief acceptance speech.

“The 5Star Movement and the League have reached an agreement on a political government headed by Giuseppe Conte as prime minister,” the two party leaders said in a joint statement.

However, the two parties’ “contract for a government of change” which has raised eyebrows across Europe because it includes radical and costly social and economic reforms as well as an overall skeptical tone on Europe.

Carlo Cottarelli, the second person asked by Mattarella to form a government this week after the previous Conte Cabinet line-up failed to get approval, officially returned his mandate earlier on Thursday, paving the way for the populists to take control.

The new Cabinet will face a vote of confidence in both houses of parliament, where the 5Stars and League have a thin majority. The far-right Brothers of Italy, a League ally, said it would help by abstaining in that vote.

The prospect of a populist and Euroskeptic government in Italy, the third-largest economy in the eurozone, has already rattled markets and worried its EU partners.

There were already signs this week of the tension to come between Rome and Brussels: First, it was the German European Commissioner Günther Oettinger, who suggested that the financial markets would teach Italians not to vote for populists. He later apologized for his remarks after being scolded by Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker, among others.

“Regardless of which political party may be in power, Italy is a founding member of the European Union that has contributed immensely to European integration," read a statement from the Commission.

"President Juncker is convinced that Italy will continue on its European path. The Commission is ready to work with Italy with responsibility and mutual respect," said the statement on Juncker's behalf. "Italy deserves respect.”

But on Thursday it was Juncker who was annoying the Italians, with reported remarks that Italians should do "more work."

“Italians have to take care of the poor regions of Italy. That means more work; less corruption; seriousness,” Juncker was quoted as saying at a conference.

The Commission president, a former prime minister of Luxembourg, was also critical of some members of the new alliance for blaming Brussels and the European Union for Italy’s problems.

European Parliament President Antonio Tajani shot back on Twitter that Juncker should distance himself from the comments, if they are genuine.

“I ask European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker to immediately deny the comments attributed to him, because if they are true they would be unacceptable,” tweeted Tajani. A spokesperson for Juncker said his words had been taken out of context.